Mike waved across at the other boat, squinting at the occupant until they came into focus. Until she came into focus, Mike mentally corrected, looking her over with a quick, appreciative nod. (Should he go easy on her? Or should he show off how obviously great he was as a trainer?) Either way, when he waved again, he made sure to flex his chest. It wasn't like he expected anything, but, there was no shame in trying to make himself look good.

"Yeah," he called back, "Just one on one. You're fightin' my horsea, he's down there. Part dragon, you know." He had a suspicion that wasn't quite true yet, but whatever. It sounded good.

"I'm Mike, by the way!" he shouted by way of introduction, rowing closer to her boat as best he could. ”I don’t think I caught your name.” The oars squealed in their brackets and Mike ground his teeth together with frustration. Stupid pieces of shit --

< And I'm Kickstart, > the eevee chirped, < You better watch out! >

Mike scratched his fingers through the thick fluff of Kickstart's collar, encouraging the rowdy behavior. It was fucking hysterical, and maybe one day his bite would catch up with his bark.

When the girl popped her neck, as if limbering up for her own battle, Mike predictably read it as less intimidation and a bit more flirtation. He rolled his own shoulders in response, twisting in the seat to make his chest look as broad as possible. He had a fairly good build, he worked out. He had a shot, right?

”What’s that thing?” he nodded towards the Chinchou, eyes tracking the bulbous, glowing lures as they sank beneath the waves. ”I could go for one of those, that guy is cool as fuck.”

The girl and her pokemon, cute as they were, were up to business, however, and Mike leaned over the side of the boat as he strained to see into the water. The sudden, bursting flash of electricity didn’t escape him, though line of sight with Gin did, and Mike was suddenly very, very nervous.

---

Tail curled tightly around the slimy stalk of kelp, Gin let himself drift easily with the push and pull of the ocean. This was good, this was so much better than the tiny tank he’d been living in, before Mike took him. If the human could bring him to places like this, maybe he was worth it as a trainer after all.

He tilted his head from side to side, tiny pectoral fins fanning to keep him upright. Just because he couldn’t see out of his left eye didn’t mean he wasn’t diligent -- in fact, he was even more so than normal. He had to defend his territory; had to be ready for whatever fight came his way.

Gin noticed the other fish before Mike could give any kind of warning or command --

And he lost it.

< You think you're hot shit? Come over here and see what happens, > Gin shouted, fins a blur at his side, < I'll rip your legs off, fuckin' try me! > His body went stiff and he drifted away from the kelp, puffing his chest out as he postured aggressively.

The expletives quite literally bubbling from his mouth were cut short as the harsh wave of blue light exploded out through the water. Before Gin even had a chance to figure out what was going on, the electricity was flowing through him. His muscles went rigid, and, already a poor swimmer when completely unhindered, he was unable to get out of the way of the following blast of sound.

The screech seemed to scrape along the inside of his skull, twisting his mind and making what little vision he did have swim and bounce.

Words filtered down from above, but they were fuzzy; gibberish. He squinted, disoriented -- torn between his need to attack and his sudden insecurity about where the fuck he even was, Gin stayed mostly motionless in the water.

A blue-and-yellow blob, faintly glowing, drifted across his range of vision, and -- that’s right, he thought with as close to a snarl as a horsea can manage, he was fighting. A thick stream of bubbles erupted from his mouth towards the chinchou, jetting Gin backwards with the force of the expulsion.

---

“Can you hear me--”

Mike jammed his hand against the microphone’s send button, frustrated and slick with salty water.

“Oi, Gin! Use smokescreen! These bitches play dirty!”

He paused after a moment, brow knit as he replayed his words in his head.

“Well,” he turned towards the other boat, “Not, you know, like not bitches, bitches. These ‘people’, you know.”

< Bitches! > Kickstart parroted, with all the raucous glee of a toddler who’s picked up a bad word.

Mike waved him off, which the eevee took as a sign to try and intimidate the opposition. (This involved, mostly, various attempts at deep and raspy growls, which Mike suspected the girl couldn’t even hear over the wind.) He slid off the seat to kneel on the bottom of the boat, knees pressed painfully against the glass as he watched Gin drift below.

“Gin!” He shouted again, this time able to see a hint of recognition in the horsea’s eye, “Smokescreen!”

A thick, inky cloud bloomed around Gin’s tiny form, spreading much more quickly than Mike had been expecting. It wasn’t long before Mike couldn’t see anything out the bottom of his boat, and he stood in favor of leaning over the side again. He made sure his egg was still stowed safely with his bag, then snatched the pokedex out of the side pocket.

Shit, what could he even do against this pokemon? Gin only knew other water-type moves and, okay, yes, maybe Mike should have thought about that before rushing off to the magidome. Lesson learned.

“Fuck.”

< Bitches!! >

<sup>lvl 15. sniper. bubble | smokescreen | leer | water gun

gin swims out to posture aggressively at The Intruder, and is struck by thunder wave and confuse ray.
gin uses bubble and then smokescreen to surround himself.  due to paralysis, he is unable to return to the kelp stalk.
status - paralysis (33% full paralysis). confusion - 1/? turns.
GIN GREW TO LEVEL 17 [56/500]; 2/7.  GIN LEARNED TWISTER.

words 981 tag @saltine</sup>

So, the girl wasn't impressed with his antics.  Though he was loath to admit it, that particular tactic was pretty hit-or-miss: he was used to it.  He grinned, broad and toothy, and winked over at her.  "So you think we're cute?"

He mimicked her posture and leaned over the edge of his boat, pressing his own meaty pecs together as he pouted back at her.  (He may or may not have let his eyes wander over her cleavage: that wasn't important at the moment.)  Kneeling on the hard floor of the boat, he tilted further forward as he attempted to track the movement of her glow-fish.

"Gin! Can you hear me?"

His muffled voice carried through the water, but, unsurprisingly, Mike could see nothing through the slowly-diffusing smokescreen.  He didn't have an answer for the girl's last taunt -- he was royally fucked and he knew it, especially if zappy mcgee over there was carrying any electric-type moves besides thunder wave.

"It moved up towards the surface," he announced through the microphone, "Keep up your smokescreen.  I'll figure this out."

Kickstart watched him quietly from the bench, ears twitching.

After a beat, his tiny voice broke Mike's train of thought: < Gin can't even get him?  Want me to tackle him? >

Mike laughed.

"Nah, runt, this is Gin's fight.  Besides, this water's real deep."

Whatever Kickstart's reply, Mike waved him silent a second later when Gin's tiny form drifted into view.  His good eye looked nearly as glazed as his bad one, and he was swimming... crooked.  Mike didn't have any better way to describe it, and he knew the confusion had taken hold.

"God damn it," he hissed, under his breath, scrambling for his bag.  His pokedex was beeping, but right now, he needed to find an item -- something, anything, to snap Gin out of it.

Ding.

All he had were potions, and -- no, that was an empty water bottle.

Ding.

Pokeballs, Nestly(TM) poke-egg incubator, some potions, an empty water bottle, half a bag of trail mix: none of this shit was useful in the slightest right now.  Mike kicked himself for not hitting up the mart before scheduling a battle.

Ding.

"Yes, okay, what," he snapped at the pokedex like it had personally offended him, and snatched it up roughly.  The [!] notification blinked, helpful, over Gin's information: NEW MOVE LEARNED.  Mike toggled to the menu just as the boat shuddered and tilted nose-down.

"Hey - hey, HEY--" the bewilderment was cut short, a rare silence washing over Mike as surprise put him on his ass.

The sky just over his boat was darkening, rapidly.  The ocean just behind his boat swelled up with an energy trapped just below the surface -- at the center of which, Mike could just barely see, was Gin, good eye glowing with power.  The surface broke and water jutted forward in a swirling pillar.  The water spout, though weak and tilted to one side, snapped Mike's boat up like it was nothing and threw it aside like a ragdoll.

Mike, Kickstart, and his bag were thrown bodily into the water, even as the twister sputtered and fell.

Saltwater punched its way into his nostrils and Mike flailed to the surface, shaking wet hair from his eyes as he tried to reorient himself.

"SHIT," he shouted, to no one in particular, and paddled with a weak freestyle to where Kickstart was struggling to keep afloat.

His boat, a few yards away, flickered and disappeared for a brief second as the magidome reset its gear: it blinked back into existence dry and right-side-up... and he, of course, was still in the water.

"Really?  Really??"

Kickstart was quiet, seemingly struggling to keep his head above water as his tiny feet kicked feebly.  Mike grabbed him and all but threw him into the boat, then ducked back under the water for his bag.  If his incubator got fucked up, he swore to Arceus...

The bag went up next, then Mike, who rested halfway into the boat with his ass hanging over the side.

"What the fuck was that? Did you do that? Did--" he flopped into the boat like a fish out of water and slapped his hand against the transmit button, "Gin! Did you just fuckin' try and murder me?  Use that on them, not me!"

Below them, Gin drifted, still dazed, spinning in slow circles with the residual energy from his half-cocked twister.

<sup>lvl 17. sniper. bubble | smokescreen | leer | water gun | twister

gin tried to use twister, but hurt himself in his confusion, and knocked mike's boat over.  oops.
status - paralysis (33% full paralysis). confusion - 2/? turns.
GIN GREW TO LEVEL 18 [287/525]; 3/7. 

words 731 tag @saltine</sup>

Mike sprawled in the bottom of his boat like a stunned fish, saline burning through the back of his nostrils and down his throat. He coughed once, twice, shaking soaked hair from his forehead as he ignored the girl's taunts in favor of scrabbling for the incubator.  It was a chunky cylinder, padded with thick insulating material.  He yanked it out of his bag and rolled it with a flat palm across the floor of the boat.  Water clung in droplets to the glass, but as Mike spun it, he didn't see any cracks on the dull blue egg within.

Relief flooded through him and he flopped, relaxed, back onto the pane of glass.  Kickstart was trying in vain to shake his pelt dry -- Mike might have found it funny in any other circumstance, but as his terror faded, the only emotion left was a bright and growing irritation.

What kind of piece of shit, cowardly trainer relied on status conditions and then had the audacity to bitch at their opponent about it?

Vaulting back to the seat, Mike leaned out over the water to look for Gin.  A renewed vigor pumped through him, an edge of rage lighting up his need to absolutely destroy this girl and her (admittedly cool) fish.

He slammed down on the transmit button, pressing so hard into the console with his closed fist that he could hear the metal creak.  "Gin, buddy, I can't see ya, but I need you to snap out of it, alright?  You're fighting that glow-fish, I can't see you, but if you can follow my voice, it's ahead of my boat-"

As if on cue, the water just off the starboard bow flickered with a bright, sudden light, like a pilot light warming up before combustion.  A ball of winding electricity lit the girl's fish in stark contrasts, and chased away the lingering shadows of Gin's smokescreen.

He didn't have long.

"Gin!  Dodge!  Get back in the kelp--"

Below, the horsea's mind cleared, and he locked on to the gently bobbing glow of the chinchou's lures.  He shook himself, just in time to hear Mike's warning, but it wasn't enough.  His muscles were stiff and unresponsive, and all he could do was drift on the troughs of waves rolling overhead, watching the electroball streak towards him with his one good eye.

It smacked into him and enveloped him in a blanket of pain, extra conductive in the ocean brine.  A small stream of bubbles escaped his mouth in a silent scream.

He couldn't see much from above, his own vision still obscured from the smokescreen, but Mike's voice was now registering loud and clear:  "Gin!  Twister again, but this time aim it flat!  Get that thing away from you--"

Gin didn't need to be told twice. Pectorals fanning at his sides, he steadied himself as best he could -- a difficult task, with the pain still running hot through every muscle in his body.  His eyes glowed, faintly, and after a moment, the ocean seemed to sway to his beat rather than its own.  A whirlpool gathered in front of his snout, small at first, like a draining tub and rapidly gaining in size.  He unleashed the twister with a shout, and it whipped off in a crooked line towards the chinchou.

< Arrh! Get away from my kelp! >

<sup>lvl 18. sniper. bubble | smokescreen | leer | water gun | twister

gin takes a critical electroball and is very close to fainting, but snaps out of his confusion and tries another twister.
status - paralysis (33% full paralysis). confusion - 3/3 turns.
GIN GREW TO LEVEL 19 [320/550]; 4/7. 

words 558 tag @saltine</sup>

Many things happened at once.

As the Chinchou managed to stabilize itself, Gin went rigid, muscles locking and refusing to cooperate.  Unable to maintain his questionable control over his previous attack, the wavering funnel of the twister shuddered and seemed to thrash in the water.  It swung in broad strokes across the battlefield, arcing around the Chinchou and his trainer's boat.  The Chinchou's bulbs grew bright with electricity and it fired off another electroball just as the twister bent in on itself and shot straight back towards Mike's boat.

He watched it come in slow motion, unable to get to the oars fast enough to get himself out of the way.  Instinctively, he grabbed the incubator under one arm and caught Kickstart's scruff with the other hand.  He didn't even have time to speak -- just a short, startled yell -- and he was airborne again.  The boat spun bow-over-stern, flipping through the air even higher than Mike.

He plunged into the water with a hard smack against his shoulder as it entered, splashing down between the Chinchou and his Horsea.

The responding klaxon was deafening.

ERROR.  UNSAFE CONDITION.

In the blink of an eye, the ocean and softly waving kelp bed were gone, replaced with the dull grey grid of an unused magidome arena.  Mike lay, soaked, on the floor, Kickstart still gripped by the scruff, and Gin flopping, quite surprised, on the now-dry floor.

PLEASE RECALL ALL AQUATIC POKEMON.  UNSAFE CONDITION.

"Well no shit," Mike snapped back, still groggy, as he fumbled with Gin's pokeball.

< What- what happened, > Gin gasped, fins struggling doubly against the paralysis now that he was out of water, < Is he gone?  Put me back, I need to teach him a lesson. >

"Next time, bud," Mike replied, still flat on his back, and recalled the Horsea in a brief flare of red light.

When he finally released Kickstart and stood, his attention was squarely on Sophie.  Short temper stoked from the unique disappointment of ending a fight without a clear winner, he shouted at her: "You tryin' to fuckin' kill me?  What the fuck, lady?"

<sup>lvl 19. sniper. bubble | smokescreen | leer | water gun | twister

gin is fully paralyzed and loses control of his twister, which swoops back around and bats mike out of the boat again.  the magidome shuts the simulation down before mike can be electrocuted.  gg, mike!
status - paralysis (33% full paralysis).
GIN GREW TO LEVEL 20 [119/575]; 5/7. 

words 349 tag @saltine</sup>